Mickadeit: Fence still up; boxer recovered

I usually run my year-end "What Ever Happened To ...?" columns at, well, year's end. Events conspired to delay that, but like those Christmas cards that arrived Dec. 26, does it really matter? So here we go.

THE FENCE

Then: A Garden Grove code-enforcement officer last summer tagged Marlem Mason's white picket fence for being between 4 and 8 inches higher than the code allows. The fence runs 24 feet along a side yard and blocks no views whatsoever. Mason had the fence put in 12 years before to fulfill a promise he made to his wife, Helen, in 1961. It attracted no attention until last year when the Masons and a neighbor got into a spat over other code issues and that neighbor apparently reported the fence. In August, an apologetic city hearing officer said he had no choice but to find that the fence was too high. It would have to be cut to size or removed.

Now: The fence still stands. City officials never seemed too keen on citing the Masons in the first place. Plus, a couple of things happened after the ruling that I think made them even less prosecution-minded: 1) a torrent of reaction from citizens who were as dumbfounded as me; 2) a photo that began circulating of an identical fence located in a yard about one block from Mayor William Dalton's house. The implication: Go after this ticky-tack stuff and this is going to get much uglier and wasteful.

THE BOXER

Then: In August, my colleague, competitor and friend Norberto Santana suffered a concussion while boxing, a sport I had proudly reintroduced him to. Norberto, a fiery Cuban American who runs the Voice of OC investigative website, is generally wound tighter than the inside of a Titleist, and before the fight I'd been so happy to see him in an activity that had considerably calmed him down outside the ring. On Fight Night, he lost a split decision but was never knocked down and seemingly was never even hit hard. But later that night, he began experiencing intense nausea. His wife called paramedics. He ended up in the hospital with a bleeding brain.

Now: After a scary weekend and a couple of tough months, he's OK. His doctors believe he was injured during sparring a week before the fight and reinjured himself during the fight itself. Also, he had been taking aspirin, and that had thinned his blood, making him more susceptible to bleeding.

"I was in a lot of pain in Aug/Sept/Oct as the docs waited for the swelling to go down and we avoided drilling into my head," he wrote me this week. "Though I generally managed to write a story a week in Sept/Oct, it was very tough both personally and professionally."

He won't fight again, of course, but he plans to come back into the gym soon and work the bags. "The whole experience ... has strengthened my faith in God and underscored how incredibly lucky and blessed I am to have such a great family and friends who care so much about my health! ... Can you please mention that my wife is a saint for putting up with me, nursing me back to health and doing a great job with (Maximo, their son)?"

Least I can do for getting him into this.

THE KILLERS

Then: NanettePackard Johnston and Eric Naposki were sentenced to life in prison for the 1994 murder of William McLaughlin. Nanette was sentenced in May. At that hearing, Naposki refused to leave his cell next to Judge William Froeberg's courtroom to hear McLaughlin's children and friends give their emotional victim-impact statements. Naposki finally had to face the music at his August sentencing. He used the opportunity to name the man he says Nanette actually hired to shoot McLaughlin. Police said they had looked into the guy and found nothing connecting him to the murder.

Now: Nanette and Naposki are settling down for the rest of their natural lives in state prisons, she in Chowchilla, he at Susanville. Also, the first of two books has been published. "Wealthy Men Only: The True Story of a Lonely Millionaire, a Gorgeous Younger Woman, and the Love Triangle that Ended in Murder," by Stella Sands, is now available through the usual sources. The second book, tentatively titled "I'll Take Care of You," by Caitlin Rother, is in the editing stage.

Mickadeit writes Mon.-Fri. Contact him at 714-796-4994 or fmickadeit@ocregister.com.